


Now Here You Go Again

by AmbitiousSkychild



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: A little angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bi Richie Tozier, But It Had To Happen, Eddie Kaspbrak Loves Richie Tozier, Fluff, Gay Eddie Kaspbrak, Internalized Homophobia, Language, M/M, Rated T for Trashmouth, Richie Tozier Loves Eddie Kaspbrak, Sonia Kaspbrak's A+ Parenting, but it's the losers club of course there's language, in the title and to set the mood in the fic, only richie and eddie invited, richie learns a lesson, there's so much fluff, underground gay prom in the clubhouse, warning for fleetwood mac
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-30
Updated: 2020-05-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:53:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24462325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmbitiousSkychild/pseuds/AmbitiousSkychild
Summary: “Prom night. Don’t make any plans ‘cause I’m taking you out.”It makes Eddie scoff. “Will you fucking knock it off—?”“No, shut up, I mean it, Eddie,” Richie insists in this gentle tone he never really uses with the others. He looks so earnest and open, pleading with his eyes as he leans closer and it’s all so much that it makes Eddie want to run, pressing further back into the unforgiving wall. “Give me a chance. Prom night, eight ‘o’clock. Dress nice. I’ll pick you up. I’ll make it good, I promise.”He hasn’t seen Richie so serious since the fucking clown. His heart is beating triple the regular speed. It only speeds up the longer Richie stares at him like that. He looks down at his hands… and surrenders. “Okay, Richie.”“Fuck, really?”Or: Richie finally shoots his shot, but thanks to years of Richie's teasing, Eddie has doubts
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 28
Kudos: 291





	Now Here You Go Again

**Author's Note:**

> This took me so long, I just wanted to write something about Richie learning that he doesn't have to hide everything behind jokes and that in fact, sometimes hiding his feelings behind his jokes does WAY more harm than good and then this crazy thing happened
> 
> Have some repressed boys literally dancing around their feelings

“Well… you.”

“What?”

Eddie asks it before he’s sure he’s even processed what Richie’s just _said_.

They’re sprawled across Eddie’s bed together in the middle of the night, supposedly reading comics, but they haven’t been really. Not for the last half hour or so because the subject changed at some point, seemingly innocuously enough, to something Bev asked earlier and now Richie’s said _that_ and—

He sits up, needs to see Richie’s face for this, but Richie doesn’t move but to bring the comic down lower over his eyes. He appears to be trying to sink further into Eddie’s mattress, head pressing deeper and deeper into Eddie’s pillow. The pillow they’d been sharing not ten seconds ago, before Richie _said that_ and—

This is all Bill and Bev’s fault, Eddie thinks stupidly, irrationally, because _they’re_ the ones that made Richie start thinking about this at all. _They’re_ the ones that came to some dumb long overdue agreement that maybe they should date now, and _they’re_ the ones going to prom now because of it, and making all the rest of them have to hear about it, and making Stan feel pressured to ask some girl he barely knows, and making Ben just about purple with envy, and making Mike feel a type of ostracized he’s never supposed to feel as long as he’s with the losers.

_They’re_ the ones that asked earlier today in the clubhouse, at the realization that not all of them were going to get this chance, who the rest of them would take to prom if they could, and made Ben bite his lip, and made Mike roll his eyes, and made Eddie hate his mom and gave Richie the opportunity to say: “ _Eddie’s mom!_ ” and made Eddie want to strangle him to death because _of course_ that’s what he’d say. That’s what he said just hours ago, when the sun was still up, and they were all who they’re supposed to be, but _now_ , in the dark and the blue of Eddie’s room when it’s just them, just he and Eddie, and the only place to hide is Eddie’s pillow which smells like both of them—

“I said,” Richie speaks up finally, slowly moves the comic down to just under his eyes as he meets Eddie’s. “That if I could take anyone I wanted without judgment to stupid prom or whatever, I’d take you.”

It hangs another moment more, in the air between them like a loose string, or a bad smell or—

Or worse yet, a bad _joke_.

Eddie’s jaw sets, twitching and jumping like it does when he gets like this. He feels his teeth grinding, he’s so mad, and trying so much harder not to be. His fingers twitch against the palm of his hand as he tries to stay cool. He looks at Richie who’s looking anywhere else but back and says at him, rather than to him: “ _Me_.”

It’s flat and lifeless, purposely bereft of anything to betray any sort of expectation and that— _that_ gets Richie’s attention, makes him set the comic aside, makes him sit up slow and careful like he’s being stared down by an Eddie with sharp teeth instead of an Eddie with tiny hands and eyes so big he looks like a cartoon.

Richie’s hands are splayed behind him on the mattress, holding him up as he stares. His legs are long and endless down the bed, one hitched up at the knee, foot against calf and one of Eddie’s legs is stuck between the two of them, and still he _stares_. “Yeah,” he says. Defiant like a challenge, steady like he’s proving something, and Eddie wishes rabidly for sharp teeth.

“What the hell would you wanna take _me_ for?” It’s as sharp as he wishes his teeth were, and that makes Richie flinch.

“Don’t make me say it.”

“Well you’re gonna have to, Richie, if you want me to have any idea what you’re talking about.”

Richie huffs, annoyed and petulant, as if Eddie is being difficult on purpose. “It’s _obvious_ , man.”

“Well then why don’t you spell it out for me, since I’m such a fucking dumbass?”

So Richie drops his head onto his knee and groans into his jeans: “I _like_ you, Eds! Why else would I wanna take you to prom and risk getting my ass kicked? God I think it’d be worth it if I just got to hold your hand for two seconds, do you seriously not _know?_ ”

Speechless. Eddie is _speechless_ as Richie’s words hang in the expanse between them again–a looser string, a worse smell, _god help Richie’s soul if this is another bad joke_ —

His head feels like it’s cycling—can’t slow down, synapses exploding, snapping and firing, and he thinks, nonsensically, that he’s not really mad at Bill and Bev. He knows that. It’s just easier to be mad at them for indirectly starting something nice that Richie would directly turn cruel. It’s easier to be angry with them for having it so easy, than it is to be angry with Richie, or even himself, because he has it so hard.

Because sometimes, where Richie is involved, Eddie’s insides get all weird. They swirl and twist all over themselves— _butterflies,_ some idiot once called them, and Eddie’s not stupid, he knows exactly what that means, and that’s the whole _problem_. Eddie wants to snap at him, but he doesn’t— _can’t_ , stuck staring wide-eyed back at a Richie he’s quite frankly never seen before.

His face is still resting on his knee, still angled away toward Eddie’s bedroom door, like he’s keeping watch, but really, he’s hiding. Deep down inside of Eddie is a stupid fraction of himself that never learns, that aches for simplicity, that wants to believe Richie.

It’s been there since the day they met–this need, this compulsion, to hang on every single stupid word Richie says, and that was all fine and good until Richie figured that out. He used to string Eddie along with any big, stupid, long story he could think of back when they were tweens, just to see how long he could get Eddie to believe him.

When Richie came out to them their freshman year, it took a while for that to stick, took a while for the rest of them to decide that it was true, that even Richie wouldn’t make a joke about something like that, but just about everything else has been anyone’s guess since.

Back in sophomore year, they had an assignment on limericks and Richie wasted an entire week writing one a day and stuffing them into Eddie’s locker, all addressed to Eddie’s mom. In junior year, he spent nine months playing with Eddie’s feelings like a fucking paddleball just on the walks to Eddie’s classes alone. This goes from sweet and thoughtful when no one’s paying attention and Richie’s guiding him through the crowds by the elbow, to condescending and pointedly embarrassing when Richie’s dragging him along behind him like he’s a little kid who’ll run off without supervision any time Eddie starts to think things have started to go too smoothly between them.

He likes to poke and prod and taunt at Eddie in public anyway, and jeer at him in front of his friends like the greatest thing Eddie could ever do for him is to blow up. Get all red-faced and yell at him and embarrass himself while at it—get angry and look like a fucking maniac.

And then Richie met the theatre kids who think Eddie is hilarious. They like to laugh at him just as much as Richie does, so he joined the drama club this year since it only made sense. _It’s where he belongs_ , Eddie thought with a bitterness he can never quite swallow anymore. Richie’s kind of always been a performer, and he’s one of the drama club’s best for a reason. He likes lying to an audience and playing games and his favorite game just so happens to be Eddie Kaspbrak.

A day doesn’t go by without Richie tugging at his shorts or unzipping his fanny pack and dumping it out just to get him to yell or blowing cigarette smoke in his face just to watch him gag. Not a day goes by without Richie using him like a _prop_.

This is all just more—

“ _Bullshit_ ,” Eddie finally answers. He doesn’t let himself be swayed by the mounting shock and confusion on Richie’s face.

“Eddie,” he breathes, and _oh_ , is it convincing, _oh_ , “don’t—”

“No, _fuck_ you, I’m not falling for this. I know you’re just fucking with me; I _know_ this is some long roundabout _I-fucked-your-mom_ joke in the making, Richie, I’m not an _idiot_ , I’m not—I’m not letting you get my hopes—”

_Fuck_.

“You don’t want me getting your hopes up,” Richie echoes, distracted, eyes unfocused like he’s figuring it all out, trying to parse out _what_ , exactly, Eddie’s hopes must be and—

Eddie can’t have that. “That’s not what I meant,” he snaps, but it’s like Richie’s not even listening. He still doesn’t look quite right, but now there’s some hope of his own back in his eyes, a bit of that familiar quirk to his lips, and it’s terrible but Eddie wants to squash it before Richie hurts him with it. “And I said like five other things aside from that, by the way. You know, like how I’m not an idiot—”

“So, you’d believe me if you thought I was serious?”

It makes Eddie freeze up, how hard-set he looks as he finally meets Eddie’s eyes, how… honest. _God_.

“But I don’t. Because you’re not.”

“Fine. I’ll prove it.”

And that one has Eddie rearing back a bit this time, bumping his head against the wall as he does. “No,” he manages.

“Yeah,” Richie says, like he’s still not listening. He nods once to himself, then locks eyes with Eddie again, determined and genuine, and everything that’s ever worked to make Eddie believe him. “Prom night. Don’t make any plans ‘cause I’m taking you out.”

It makes Eddie scoff. “Will you fucking _knock it off—?_ ”

“No, shut up, I mean it, Eddie,” Richie insists in this gentle tone he never really uses with the others. He looks so earnest and open, pleading with his eyes as he leans closer and it’s all so much that it makes Eddie want to _run_ , pressing further back into the unforgiving wall. “Give me a chance. Prom night, eight ‘o’clock. Dress nice. I’ll pick you up. I’ll make it good, I _promise_.”

He hasn’t seen Richie so serious since the fucking clown. His heart is beating triple the regular speed. It only speeds up the longer Richie _stares_ at him like that. He looks down at his hands… and surrenders. “Okay, Richie.”

“Fuck, really?”

“Guess I’m an idiot,” he huffs bitterly to himself.

“You’re not, Eddie, you’re—”

“ _Richie_ ,” Eddie says, and it comes up out of him like the gut-torn disappointment and heartbreak he’s felt the last five years or so have all developed voices of their own. “If you’re fucking with me… if this is all just a trick, I don’t know if I’ll forgive you. I’m serious.”

“Eddie, I’d never—” he starts, only to fall back on his words at Eddie’s glare. He blinks slowly at him, gaze turning contemplative. “I wouldn’t ever hurt you on purpose,” he amends. Then: “Trust me,” as if he has any right, and then he lifts his hand from the comforter.

Eddie watches, paralyzed as it almost closes the distance between them, almost comes to touch his face, but then Richie retracts it, like he thought better of it. Like that had been stupid. Maybe it was.

Instead he gets up, and Eddie’s so out of it, he almost tells Richie not to. It’s silent as Richie steps over to Eddie’s desk and shrugs his jacket on, pats himself for his keys. He steps onto the desk and starts to climb out the window. “Prom night,” he repeats to Eddie as he straddles the window sill. “Just you wait.” Then he’s gone.

Eddie’s heart is still beating too fast in his chest as he lies down in Richie’s spot, tries to breathe deep and even to calm it down. His bed still smells like Richie, and he realizes absurdly, that he barely even knows what happened tonight.

Through the open window, he hears Richie’s truck start, hears him pull away from the curb and he hates, hates, hates himself for missing him already. He shuts his eyes, tries to block it all out. He sighs to himself.

“ _Idiot_.”

*

“If Richie asked you out, would you believe him?”

“Richie Tozier?” Stan looks up with a laugh, as if there were ever really any confusion. “No, not for a second,” he answers. Eddie hums, and then Stan’s eyes are on him like he’s just given away something crucial. It lasts barely a second, then he turns those all-seeing eyes of his back onto their Calculus notes. “If Richie asked me out, I think I’d demand to know who dared him to.”

Eddie scoffs without meaning to, flips through his own notes. He thinks to himself that it’s too fucking hot for this. Thinks it’s dumb to be doing this at all, studying fucking _Calculus_ that is, at the fucking quarry while the rest of their friends are down below swimming and being some variation of normal.

But he just can't be down there.

He doesn’t want to be in the quarry half naked, around _Richie_ half naked. In the two days since _that night_ , things have been weird. And okay, maybe that’s not entirely fair. Richie’s been fine, it’s Eddie who’s confused.

It’s Eddie who doesn’t know what to do now when Richie smiles at him in the hallways all soft and slow–doesn’t know what to do with the fact that he notices that aside from just about hide his head in his locker. It’s _Eddie_ who doesn’t know what to do when Richie walks him to most of his classes if they’re on the way to Richie’s aside from pull Bev along just about kicking and screaming and completely clueless.

It’s getting harder not to think about the way that, now that the needless taunting is gone, now that Richie’s not saying or doing anything for the sole purpose of getting a reaction out of him, Richie isn’t acting all that different from how he used to.

That he’s just noticing it this way because Richie put a different lens on the behavior.

Richie’s been fine. It’s _Eddie_ who’s waiting desperately for the other shoe to drop.

Stan hums, and Eddie realizes he’d just about forgotten all about him. “Is this part of you and Richie’s weird… _thing?_ ” he asks, because that’s all he knows about it. It’s all any of the other losers know and Eddie intends to keep it that way. “You know I won’t choose sides, but hypothetically, if Richie asks me out, I’d assume he’s probably getting something out of it, and that’s my final answer. Did I pass?” he teases.

“Exactly,” Eddie bites out. “He can’t be trusted. I knew it.”

“What’s this about? He’s… _not_ planning on asking me out is he?” Stan asks, sounding a little wary now, and Eddie huffs, brings his knees up to his chest.

“No, not that I know of. Not unless he plans on making his way through all of us.”

“All of us, huh? Who’s he asked already?”

Eddie’s silence is telling enough.

“Oh.” Stan says deeply at the realization that Eddie hasn’t been being hypothetical after all.

“Yeah. I tried to turn him down.”

“Turn him— _why_ would you do that?”

Eddie shrinks in on himself as Stan looks at him like _he’s_ the idiot. “Because of our weird… _thing_ ,” Eddie decides, settling on the easy way out. “Like you said. And you _just_ said, by the way, you wouldn’t even believe him!”

“Yeah, that’s if he asked _me_ out, but _you’re_ … What did he _say?_ ”

“He said if he could take anyone he wanted to prom he’d take me,” Eddie relays, syllables too fast and just about tumbling over themselves as he tries not to outwardly preen at the words, tries not to melt from the inside out like he almost had then, tries not to let Stan _see_. “Said he _likes_ me.” He huffs. “He’s full of shit and he’s an asshole.”

Stan sputters a bit, something between a choke and a laugh. “Okay, I guess now I wanna retract my earlier statement and revise a little,” he manages. He gives up on his Calculus work altogether, puts all his notes back into his open backpack and clears his throat just to be haughty, just because he knows it’ll make Eddie roll his eyes. “If Richie asked me out, no, I wouldn’t believe him for a second,” he repeats, and Eddie gets halfway through a sigh of relief before Stan ruins it. “But if he asked you out, I don’t know. That might not be so crazy.”

“Stanley, are you serious? You want me to trust Richie _I-fucked-your-mom_ Tozier about something like _this?_ ”

“It’s really not that far-fetched, Eddie, think about it. He’s always been different with you, wouldn’t you say?”

Eddie wants to say Stan doesn’t know the half of it, doesn’t know a thing about Richie being different. Stan wasn’t there that night, didn’t see the way Richie looked at him, the way he gulped for air, the way he watched Eddie carefully like he was a wild animal, like his answer meant everything, like he might not even tease him about it if Eddie’s answer turned out to be _vulnerable_ even—

Eddie scoffs. “Yeah, he’s the most annoying with me.”

“It’s Richie, what do you expect? I think he just… wants your attention,” Stan says, softer and more careful than anything else he’s said yet. It’s enough to clue Eddie in. He can feel Stan’s eyes on him, even as he glares at his knees and he knows for certain that if Stan hadn’t caught onto Eddie’s feelings before, he definitely knows about them now.

First Bill, then Ben, and now Stan. This is turning out to be one of his worst-kept secrets.

“You know he can’t just _ask_ for your attention. Richie doesn’t just ask for things,” Stan explains, eyes on said nuisance down in the quarry as he pretends to drown Bill. Bev and Mike laugh. “He annoys things out of people. He makes himself so goddamn annoying and impossible to ignore that you’ve _gotta_ pay attention to him.”

“Stan it’s not…” Eddie groans into his knees, can’t believe he has to go through this. “It’s not like that, he’s not pulling my pigtails of whatever you’re thinking,” he says, glaring when Stan outwardly scoffs at him.

“Yeah, okay, ‘unzipping your fanny-pack’ then.”

“God, Stan,” Eddie rolls his eyes and tries to ignore the fact that deep down, he kind of knows this.

He kind of knows that Richie bugs him for his attention, and he _knows_ that ever since Richie came out to them, it’s been worse. He’s just always been too afraid to ever let himself wonder why Richie delights in making him so _mad_ all the time. Usually because Richie succeeds in making him so _mad_ all the time.

“Look,” Eddie levels, stares determinedly into Stan’s eyes so maybe he’ll stop fucking _laughing_. “I know Richie, and you do too. This is just another prank. Another trick. I’ll get all dressed up and he’ll scream about fucking my mom and he’ll–he’ll make fun of me for believing him and he’ll tell you guys all about it the next day.”

Stan shrugs. “I think he might surprise you, Eddie.”

“What the fuck are you trying to say?”

“I’m saying, give him a chance, I guess. Mirror his behavior. If he’s being all ‘ _my big dick!_ ’ you know how to do that, too. If he’s serious, be serious. Give him what he gives you, you know? And if it turns out to be a prank, kick his ass.”

Eddie laughs, finally turning wary eyes onto Richie down in the quarry. “Huh. Okay,” he agrees finally, to Stan’s contentment. “I guess I could do that.”

*

Eddie stands in front of his bedroom mirror, tiny and awkward in a t-shirt he still hasn’t quite grown into. He looks at his scrawny legs and knobby knees and thinks no wonder Richie can’t stop taunting him about them. It makes him wish desperately, in a way he’d never really mean, that Richie just won’t show up, but alas, this is the way Richie catches him when he does.

A hand slaps up against Eddie’s window, makes him flinch as the pane starts to struggle upward. Eddie gets a glimpse and nearly stops breathing.

“Holy _shit_ , Rich,” Eddie manages.

It shouldn’t surprise Eddie the way it does to see Richie’s reflection appear behind him in his bedroom mirror, but Eddie knows immediately that that’s not the surprising bit. It doesn’t surprise him the way Richie shows up from nowhere, and it doesn’t surprise him the way Richie shimmies the window pane open and slips himself inside like he fucking lives here. No, what surprises him is the suit Richie’s working very hard not to crease with his acrobatics. What surprises him is the _part in his hair_ , to the side, that makes his face look older, framed more sharply, shows off his jawline and he’s actually fully combed out his curls, not just the top layer and—

Eddie whips around to see it himself, see it in the real world, watches Richie climb down from his desk and stand dead center in his bedroom like this is all normal, like he’s not the tallest, handsomest, most beautiful person Eddie’s ever _seen_ —

“You… got all dressed up,” Eddie comments, fails spectacularly at keeping the awe out of his voice.

“I—yeah,” Richie says, as if that should be obvious. He finally looks at Eddie from over the frames of his glasses with the way his head is still angled down and _oh_ , Eddie’s gone, he’s _gone_ — “You didn’t.”

The controlled blankness look on Richie’s face, the set of his shoulders, the way his hands hang heavy in his pockets–it all makes Eddie _deflate_ as he turns back around, observes his own reflection in his mirror. “I didn’t…” _think you were really coming_. “I…” _couldn’t sit around all dressed up if you weren’t coming_. “I lost track of time,” Eddie tells Richie’s reflection. He doesn’t need to look at his watch to know it’s eight on the dot. “Five minutes, okay?”

“Oh,” Richie says, simple and relieved—he even laughs a little—and then the moment is over, the tension passed. Richie throws himself backward onto Eddie’s bed, hands behind his head, the picture of undeserved comfort. “That’s cool, no rush,” he says. “But those shorts _are_ my personal favorite, Eddie. Kinda hoped they were for me, you know? I guess I get it though, they don’t really match what we’re going for tonight, so if you absolutely _have_ to change…”

“God, shut the fuck _up_ , Richie,” Eddie groans, stepping over to his closet. Richie nearly cackles as Eddie grabs what he needs and leaves for the bathroom.

When he comes back, Richie is pacing his room like he can’t sit still, but he freezes when he takes notice of Eddie, eyes roving him up and down in a way that makes his stomach swoop down to the floor. Almost as if he knows that before he got here, Eddie’d spent nearly twenty minutes in his mirror picking out everything wrong with him, everything Richie hones in on.

“Well, I miss the shorts, but I gotta say he cleans up nice,” Richie says appreciatively, and Eddie rolls his eyes like that will stop his face from heating up. Eddie notes that they kind of match, in their black suits and white dress shirts, except Richie looks _good_ and Eddie looks— “Like a dapper little penguin,” Richie coos, and Eddie flips him off.

“It’s just the suit I’m gonna wear for graduation,” he says as he locks his bedroom door.

“Oh, great minds,” Richie grins, stepping backward to the window. He’s backlit by the moonlight, outlined in silver like something royal, something that’s _meant_ to be noticed. Eddie can’t help but grin back as he follows.

They shimmy down the side of the house, mindful of Eddie’s mother, who is downstairs in her recliner like always, silently delighting in the fact that her precious boy isn’t going to prom tonight with some dirty girl or his disgusting friends.

Still Eddie knows that even both of those options would be better to her than what Eddie is really doing tonight. It only makes Eddie feel weirdly giddier about the sneakiness of it, the secrecy of it all, as they dash quietly out across the lawn.

He hears Richie’s keys jingle as they near the truck and Eddie reaches for the door handle right as Richie’s hand comes up to circle his wrist, halting him.

“Whoa, whoa, not just yet,” he says carefully as Eddie squints at him. “Just one teensy weensy little thing before we get going.” He says it sheepishly, more like a question than a statement, then reveals slowly from behind his back, a fucking blindfold.

Eddie blinks, suspicious amongst the residual butterflies, that Richie is up to something. That the bubble is about to burst. That maybe there’s someone in the back of Richie’s truck recording all of Eddie’s blushing and his stammering.

He tries to look unaffected, but he’s never been all that great at controlling his expressions. “Yeah, hey, what the fuck?”

He wonders if Richie thinks he’s forgotten the last time Richie wanted to surprise him, back on his fifteenth birthday. Eddie’d let Richie blindfold him only for Richie to then let him wander aimlessly through the woods by the quarry smacking into trees like an idiot until Bev finally guided him to the piñata.

Richie rolls his eyes. “Just trust me, man,” he says, almost convincingly exasperated, but Eddie knows doubt when he sees it. Richie won’t meet his eyes, like the weight of Eddie’s gaze is too heavy, like he’s sharp-toothed Eddie, and for the first time since it’s mattered, Eddie genuinely wonders why Richie would ever be even a little afraid of him.

Performing a put-upon sigh, Eddie sneaks a fruitless peak as quickly as he can into the backseat of Richie’s truck and snatches the blindfold from Richie’s hand before Richie can notice. He ignores the way his heart skips when Richie smiles. “You’ve been saying that a lot,” Eddie says. And maybe he’s only brave enough to say that at all because there’s a cloth over his eyes.

“Yeah well,” Richie starts, then Eddie feels hands over his own and it shuts him right up. Long nimble fingers pluck the cloth from him and tie it behind his head for him. “You’ve been forgetting to _do it_ lately.”

Eddie can’t even argue that that’s not how it is _at all_ with his voice stuck in his throat the way it is.

Then Richie says, nonsensically, from somewhere behind him: “Alright, going up!”

“Huh—?”

Then, Eddie’s pretty sure he momentarily blacks out when those same hands circle his middle and _lift_ him up into the truck, and when those hands proceed to buckle him in, he thinks this is _definitely_ a prank, Richie is _definitely_ toying with him, Richie _knows_ , and Eddie is _definitely_ an idiot for letting him–

“Hey, loosen up, man, huh?”

Richie’s voice comes from his left, meaning he’s getting into the driver’s seat. He must have missed Richie slam Eddie’s door, which doesn’t shut any other way, through all the panic.

“What do you mean, _loosen up_ , I _am_ loose, totally _loose_.”

“Yeah,” Richie says, then his hand _grips Eddie’s knee_ , and Eddie’s sure that his seatbelt is the only thing that keeps him from jerking up through the roof of the car. “I can tell.” His hand lingers a while before he retracts it.

The truck starts.

Eddie starts to feel an unparalleled amount of stupidity as they start to move and he sits there, sightless and trusting Richie with his entire wellbeing when he can’t even trust him with his emotions, can’t even trust him enough to be certain that they’re truly alone right now.

“So. You wanna play _I Spy?_ ”

It’s the surprise, Eddie tells himself, that makes him snort so hard it hurts his throat. He hears Richie start laughing, then he can’t stop himself from laughing either. It’s a release, Eddie tells himself, of all the pent up anxiety and dread he’s been holding onto all day. He doesn’t want to think about the way he genuinely thinks Richie is so funny sometimes, with such good timing that he doesn’t even know what to do with it.

“I spy,” Richie starts, laughter in his voice still and it makes Eddie _warm_ , “the old man in the moon that kinda looks like Stan.”

Eddie bites his lip, doesn’t want to give Richie two laughs in a row. “I spy the void.”

This time Richie laughs, tries to be discreet about waving a hand in front of Eddie’s eyes to make sure, except he accidentally hits Eddie in the face. “Sorry!” He says, before Eddie can scream about it. “Okay, I spy your mom’s sweet ass all the way from here,” he says, laughing when he can’t even dodge blind Eddie’s tiny hands.

“I think I spy the void, Rich,” Eddie tells him, biting down on a smile.

“Good, good, so _I_ spy, with my little eye,” Richie says, takes a dramatic pause, then his voice does something different, goes gentle and almost _playful_ , “something black and white and cute all over,” and Eddie freezes.

_Like a dapper little penguin._

Richie’s fucking with him again. _God_.

“And I spy you shutting the fuck up.”

Richie laughs, says, “We’re playing _I Spy_ , not _I Wish_ ,” Eddie’s very real annoyance flying right over his head, and Eddie doesn’t really know what else he’d expected. “I’m serious, loosen up, you know I just like to fuck with you,” he says, and Eddie feels it all they way down his spine like ice water. Richie sings lowly along to the radio and Eddie tries to talk himself out of jumping out of a moving car.

He tries to figure out where they are by counting the turns they take, or how long Richie stops at stop lights, but it’s useless. He just gets himself lost in his mind that way, so he settles for distracting himself with the music Richie has on in the background. Right now, it’s something by the Smiths, which throws Eddie right off. Richie usually likes much harder stuff, never has anything like this lying around.

When the truck stops, Eddie reaches up to tug off his blindfold, but Richie stops him, big hand gripping at his wrist again. “Slow your roll there, Spaghetti,” he says, and Eddie can hear the amusement in his voice. “We still got a ways to go.”

“Wha—? _How_ far to go?” Eddie demands in what he hopes is Richie’s face. “I’m not gonna let you drag me ten miles blindfolded, dipshit.”

“What did we just say about trusting me?” Richie drawls back, and when Eddie huffs in response he can just about _feel_ Richie’s grin, it’s so clockwork. “Hang tight short stack, I’ll come around and get you.”

And that’s how Eddie finds himself being guided through the woods—judging by the feel of the ground—with Richie’s hands around his, or sometimes at his waist. Richie guides him the way a dancer guides their partner into a lift, slowly the way Eddie pictures two divers might leap together, fearlessly into something terrifying.

He knows he’s felt Richie’s hands thousands of times, _millions_ of times, throughout their friendship but it’s _different_ when it’s like this, it’s _everything_ when it’s everything he can _feel_ and—

It makes Eddie feel clammy and itchy like he’s being swarmed by fucking gnats.

Richie guides him for what feels like eons until they finally stop, and Richie says, “Stay right here, okay?” right into his ear, peels his hands off Eddie’s shoulders and Eddie hates the way it makes him feel kind of stranded, bereft and untethered.

Jesus.

Eddie hears him take only a few steps ahead, then he hears the familiar squeak, groan, and slam of a latch swinging up and falling open.

“Why’d you bring me to the clubhouse?” Eddie demands.

“It’s the only place we could be alone, my love,” Richie drawls lazily and Eddie rolls his eyes even behind the blindfold, physically cannot stop himself. “Wouldn’t want any of those assholes from school to see us.”

_Who, your theatre friends?_ Eddie almost snipes, but he bites it down. “Okay,” Eddie agrees hesitantly, as Richie comes back to him.

Richie guides him carefully down the ladder, going down first and holding on to the back of Eddie’s jacket. Once they reach the bottom, he moves him over and over, then makes him stand perfectly still, not touching anything while he tinkers around, moving too quickly for Eddie to place where he is. “Fuck, just one second, Eds,” Richie calls out, followed by sounds Eddie doesn’t even try to recognize.

_Take your time_ , Eddie wants to say because he’s slipping into dread again. He’s dreading taking the blindfold off and having to face reality. He’s dreading having to open his eyes and _see_ whatever it is Richie’s planned, whatever it is he’s stupidly walked right into. He imagines the losers standing around, laughing innocently at him because they think it’s all a prank and don’t understand how much this would hurt him. He imagines, unable to stop it now, something even worse—the assholes from Richie’s drama class, down here in their secret hiding place just to laugh and gawk at Richie’s stupid, gullible best friend Eddie—and he imagines the _betrayal_ —

“Okay,” Richie chirps, voice closer than Eddie was prepared for. Large hands engulf the sides of Eddie’s face, gently tug off the blindfold and Eddie reflexively squeezes his eyes shut as Richie announces: “Feast your eyes.”

It’s not followed by any laughter or shouting or jeering–no other voices at all, just Richie’s silence dragging and dragging.

So he slowly opens his eyes… then he doesn’t want to so much as blink. “What…?” he murmurs, because the clubhouse is fully decked out in Christmas lights. The twinkling kind, and they’re all the rainbow variety.

There’s music playing from across the clubhouse, something old and soft. Something weirdly cozy, and kind of sweet in that regard. Eddie doesn’t know what to think about it other than it’s definitely not Richie’s, can’t help but wonder where Richie got it, and if he got it because he thought Eddie might like it.

All the barrels they use for sitting, and the beanbag chairs and the old stools have been pushed up against the dirt walls, out of the way to show off the old wooden slats. Ben had started to work on them months ago to give them a real sense of flooring, but never got up to finishing since senior year started.

Eddie turns to see that the latch has been shut behind them, but lighting isn’t a problem thanks to the emergency battery operated bulbs Mike brought here last summer. He’d be furious, probably, to see the way Richie’s using them now. Eddie kind of wants to be too, actually, but he’s in too much awe, and he thinks. He thinks it must be the Christmas lights that makes him feel this excited and magical inside—a hair-trigger reaction to the feeling of _Christmas_ in general and _not_ , _certainly_ not, _Richie_.

Richie who’s dead center in the middle of it all, awash in rainbow colors, arms hanging lifeless and limp at his sides, easy smile slowly dropping, the longer Eddie takes to say something.

“What is all this?” Eddie asks finally, a little breathless.

Richie starts to look, unbelievably, even more awkward, scratching mindlessly at his arm. “It’s prom,” he says.

Eddie blinks. “It’s… what?”

“Yeah, I. I said if I could take anyone without any repercussions, I would take you. So, I found a way to take you,” he explains, eyes boring holes into the unfinished wood slats, absent-minded scratching moving up to the back of his neck. He looks like he wants to die. “Is it… is it okay?”

_Is it real?_ Eddie wants to ask back, but instead, he drops his gaze. Instead he shrugs and swears he can _feel_ the way Richie bites his lip like they’re connected. Like he’s biting his own. “Did you do it all yourself?” Eddie asks the dirt because it’s kind of a dirty question. A sneaky way of trying to find out who else knows about this, if anyone else knows he’s here, if there’s anyone out there waiting for Richie to have a story to tell.

“Yeah,” Richie answers, and though he still sounds a little off, there’s pride in his voice now. “Yeah, I made everyone swear to clear out of here for the last two days. Told them my mom’s sisters were visiting and I couldn’t jerk off at home with my little cousins running around.”

Eddie snorts, can’t help it, and finally Richie relaxes. “Ew, dude.”

“It worked though,” Richie winks, and Eddie can’t help but laugh a little. “So, what do you say? Dance with me?”

The question hesitantly extends, then hangs in the air between them the same way Richie offers his hand. It reminds Eddie of the last time Richie did that, the last time his hand reached for him, back that night on Eddie’s bed when he tried to bridge the gap between them, and Eddie shrank away.

He doesn’t shrink away this time. At best this is a bluff, and at worst a cruel prank with so many layers, Eddie doesn’t think they could still be friends after this, but Eddie doesn’t shrink away. This time, he calls, what he hopes, is Richie’s bluff. He crosses the room in small, slow steps, hesitantly places his hand inside Richie’s and it’s a _symbol_ —something hopeful hanging between them for once—and he helplessly watches Richie absolutely _grin_ and tug him closer.

Eddie’s never danced this way with someone, and to his knowledge, Richie hasn’t either, but of course Richie seems to know exactly what he’s doing. He takes the hand Eddie’s placed into his and puts it over his shoulder, grabs him around the waist with his other. Confused on what to do with his other hand, Eddie freezes a minute before Richie huffs out a laugh and brings Eddie’s left hand up to join his right on Richie’s other shoulder, places both his hands around Eddie’s middle like it only makes sense.

It’s like the way a dancer might guide their partner into a lift; the way two divers might leap together, fearlessly into something terrifying—

Clammy, itchy, fucking _gnats_ —

“What is this, anyway?” Eddie blurts out. It’s the panic talking, fishing for the next trivial, weightless thing to talk about, to take the attention off himself. It makes him sound wound-tight and demanding. When he looks up at Richie, he realizes he has no idea what Eddie’s asking about, so he gestures aloofly with one hand in a circular motion about the air in a poor effort to clarify: “The music.”

Richie quirks a brow and smirks down at Eddie as if _he’s_ the idiot. “What, you don’t know? It’s like school dance tradition. I picked it because it’s nice and slow and cheesy and the school’s probably playing it for the first slow dance—”

“You don’t know either,” Eddie accuses.

Richie opens his mouth to retort but nothing comes out, brows raising as he tries to come up with something until finally he gives up, rolls his eyes. “Shut up, okay, _listen_ , I just grabbed an armful of records from my mom’s stack, dude, I don’t know! Shut up,” he insists, cracking a smile as Eddie chuckles.

“Wait, your mom’s…” Eddie trails off as he looks just over Richie’s shoulder toward the music and sees, to his horror, _Maggie Tozier’s record player_ down here in their dark, dirty underground bunker clubhouse, and beside the record player is a small box with _Maggie Tozier’s prized records_ protruding, disorganized and hapless, and Eddie thinks that maybe _this_ is the poor-taste prank Richie’s spent all this time and effort coming up with—coercing Maggie Tozier into coming down here and fucking killing them in their safe place.

Because Maggie loves her record player. It had been _her_ mother’s, and she values each record she owns more than the last. No one else is even allowed to touch them back at the Tozier house—not even _Went_. If anything were ever to happen to them, Maggie would absolutely lose her shit—her own words—so why in the fuck are they _here?_

“I just know you don’t like my stuff,” Richie says suddenly, and Eddie has to take a moment to realize that Richie is talking about his own music. And that he thinks that makes it okay to risk both of their lives at the hands of his mother.

Still, Eddie leans back a bit to look up at him, sees that at the very least he _looks_ awfully genuine. He might mean it. So Eddie says, “That’s not true, I like your stuff,” and it’s the truth.

“Bullshit. No, you don’t.”

“Yeah, I do,” Eddie argues. “Of course I do, it’s yours,” he blurts, and maybe that’s too much of the truth. He averts his eyes, tries to fix it. “You’re just always so obnoxious about it.”

“No, I’m—”

“‘ _You have no appreciation for the classics, Eddie, you’re just like Ben, you like your pop and nothing else, nothing good, I’m probably too cool to be friends with the lot of you_.’”

“Shut—!” Richie gapes, jaw agape as he tries not to laugh. He looks impressed more than anything else. Eddie’s always done a really good Richie when he wants to. “Shut _up!_ I am not that much of an asshole about music!”

“You’re that much of an asshole about _everything_ ,” Eddie says, almost too heated, because this, too, is the truth, he feels. “You’re always so smug about that kind of thing. About thinking you'd know what I like. Didn't want you to be right,” Eddie admits, challenges Richie to do something about it, which he shouldn’t have done, learns that immediately when Richie _pinches_ him.

He pinches Eddie’s hip through his shirt and Eddie yelps something undignified, jumps and messes up their swaying for a beat.

And Richie laughs something fond, says, “You petty little shit.”

It startles Eddie’s own laugh right out of him, and he can’t help but match Richie’s smile with his own as he pinches Richie back in the space between shoulder and neck. “Smug fucking bastard,” he says, snorting when Richie yelps, and it’s.

It’s nice.

They used to be like this all the time.

Honest. Playful. Easy.

They used to stay up all night together in blanket forts at Richie’s house, before Eddie’s mother started to think Richie paid too much attention to other boys. They used to laugh and laugh and _laugh_ until Went came in and told them to shut the fuck up and sleep.

Eddie used to teach Richie everything he learned from the tap classes he took up until the fourth grade, when his mom started getting weird about Eddie’s exertion and overall general safety.

Richie spins them a bit, and Eddie remembers the way there used to never be a boundary between them. The way they’d stand far too close and not think a thing about it, the way they’d lie all over each other in the blanket forts or on Richie’s bed to watch a movie. The way they’d sit thigh-to-thigh at the lunch table at school before people told them to feel weird about it.

They’d swim in the quarry with the losers and splash only each other. They’d squeeze together into the too-small space of the hammock here in the clubhouse.

They’d lie together in the grass in the Barrens and get tan and freckled, wouldn’t move until Bill told them to put on sunscreen.

They used to talk, when it started becoming apparent that they weren’t exactly normal friends, about getting out of this shithole town. Together. They used to talk about leaving as soon as Richie turned eighteen in what he thought, at the time, would be a convertible. They used to talk about getting as far away from here as they could.

Richie would talk about California, because it was clear across the country and it was sunny—brighter than here ever got. The beaches were warm, and no one would make fun of Eddie’s shorts. “ _No one but me,_ ” Richie would say with a smile and a soft nudge to his shoulder, one he would forget to pull back from.

Maybe that was all just _talk_ to Richie, but it meant the world to Eddie back then. Back then on nights he had to deal with his mom, back then on the night he learned all his medicines were fake, back then when the other boys started calling him a queer. They had stopped talking about that dream back when they were fourteen but on _these_ nights, Richie snuck over just to tell him they could still do it. They could still leave, they just had to make it a few more years, then Richie would get them out, and Eddie would never have to see Sonia or Derry ever again.

Richie used to be sweet.

Things used to be so simple, and it used to be so _easy_.

It used to be so easy to be in love with him like this.

“Eds, come on, can you get some life back in you?” Richie pipes up. Eddie looks up at him, the center of his spiraling, and he’s smirking down at Eddie with cocked brows and dimples, acts like he’s struggling to move them both. “You’re _drooping_ on me. God, sorry to bore you.”

“Oh, sorry, is this better?” Eddie asks, going completely limp.

“Hey!” Richie gasps, ducking a bit to catch Eddie’s weight. “Jesus, Eddie, stop being a _dick_ ,” he chastises as Eddie cackles. “You are going to _dance_ with me, goddammit, you fucking child.”

“I’m _trying_ , Rich, but I’m just such a petty little shit, you know,” he laughs out, and Richie laughs too, loud and involuntary, grin wide and infectious and Eddie nearly swoons for real. “I can’t control it,” he murmurs.

“Uh-huh,” Richie deadpans. Eddie rights his posture, but Richie still holds on tight, arms around his middle instead of hands now, forcing him into the weird, stilted movements of someone desperately trying to keep a beat that just isn’t there.

Eddie laughs. “You can’t even dance, anyway.”

“Oh, says _who_ , exactly?” Richie raises a challenging brow.

“Says _me_ , the person you’re tromping all over like a big dumb horse, what the fuck are you even _doing,_ giraffe legs?”

Richie huffs a laugh. “I’m doing _everything_ , because you clearly can’t keep up!”

“Can’t keep—? Fuck _you,_ I can keep up! I used to take tap, remember?”

“All the time, twinkle-toes,” Richie winks.

“Shut up, fuckhead, just—” Eddie glares at Richie’s chest, aware of just how badly he’s blushing, aware of just how well Richie can probably see it. “Come on, bust out the moves or whatever, is this prom or not?”

“Okay fine, but I’m changing the record,” Richie decides.

When he does, it’s to something Eddie knows, something he’s embarrassed to let Richie _know_ that he knows, but of course, Richie wouldn’t be his best friend if that wasn’t exactly why he put it on in the first place.

“Come on, Eds,” Richie grins, and it’s the mischievous one, the one that makes Eddie thrilled and horribly nervous all at once. He wraps his long arms around Eddie again and tugs them chest to chest. “Don’t you wanna be with me _Everywhere?_ ”

“Shut _up_ ,” Eddie laughs, despite himself. He brings his hands up to Richie’s shoulders to push him back, but winds up sliding them up and looping them around. Despite himself. “You’re not about to spend the night talking to me in Fleetwood Mac song titles.”

“Oh, but Eddie Spaghetti, I just want you to _Hold Me—_ fuck!” he hisses as Eddie pinches him again. “Keep that up and you can _Go Your Own Way_ —okay I’m sorry!” Richie rushes out, laughing and holding on tighter as Eddie tries to pull away.

Eddie surrenders back into Richie’s arms, and Richie makes an admittedly adorable point of shutting up.

The silence lasts until _Landslide_. Up to that point, Eddie had been eyeing Richie’s shoulder and thinking, stupidly, about trying to rest his head there. God, it’s the _atmosphere_ , he tells himself. The _setting_ is getting to him. When Richie speaks again, it brings him back to his senses.

“Hey, do you think this is what Bill and Bev are doing right now?” he starts, something tentative in his voice. Eddie looks up at him to see him staring off a bit, just over Eddie’s shoulder. “Like, Bev is holding onto Bill and looking up at him like he’s the handsomest man she’s ever seen, and Bill is dipping her like this,” Richie smiles, leans Eddie back as if to exemplify, “so she can’t feel anything else but his arms around her?”

Eddie blinks, stares up at Richie leaning over him, backlit by twinkling rainbow lights, soft loose curls hanging over his face. Leaned back as he is, he wonders when Richie got so _smooth_. He tries to stall for how quick his heart is beating, hopes Richie can’t fucking feel it. “I’m not looking at you like that, for the record,” he manages, pats himself on the back for not stuttering all over himself. “You think you’re so fucking funny but—”

“ _You_ think I’m funny,” Richie tells him, and it throws Eddie off all over again.

“I think you’re _dumb_ ,” Eddie recovers. “I think you’re so fucking _dumb_.”

“You think I’m cute.”

“Yeah, okay, in a tragic sort of way.”

“And that’s really cute of you. In an Eddie sort of way.”

Oh _fuck_. It’s not endearing, it’s not endearing, it’s _not_.

“What do you think Bill and Bev are doing now?”

Richie carefully brings Eddie back up as he asks. It’s soft and slow, tentative again, and he doesn’t look away from Eddie’s face, hazel eyes trailing all around it before landing safe home back on his eyes like he can’t look away. The Christmas lights are reflecting off his glasses lenses, shining in his eyes like magic, like _stars_.

“Probably sucking face,” Eddie blurts out, desperately trying to change the mood from whatever this has become, desperately trying to gather some mental space to think it all out. Richie’s arms go around his middle again, but Eddie keeps his contact on Richie’s shoulders to just his hands. “Probably grossing out everyone else in the room,” he presses with a forced, nervous kind of laugh.

“Right, ew,” Richie says, but it’s airy, distracted.

“They _would_ , too. First kiss at prom on the dance floor like a fucking cheesy romcom.”

“Totally. Gross.” Richie’s eyes duck down, then right back up.

“We-we’ll have to hear all about it.” Eddie says, sounds a little strangled as his eyes track Richie’s. He didn’t just see what he _thinks_ he saw—what he half dreads and half _hopes_ for in his stupid, shitty, hormone-addled teenage _mess_ of a brain. “Young love or some shit, right?”

Richie laughs soft and close, closer than before, says, “ _Lame_ ,” then he kisses him, cuts off Eddie’s next comment about how it’ll all probably make Ben cry.

Richie _kisses_ him, softly at first, just lips on lips and Eddie’s too shocked to _move_. He stands there, frozen, hands lifelessly slipping from Richie’s shoulders, and that’s when it all goes to shit.

Richie’s hands move up quickly from Eddie’s waist to catch his hands before they can fall, to place them back around his neck like he needs them there, like he needs Eddie to hold him, to ground him against whatever floaty thing is flittering around in between them. Richie’s hands move to hold Eddie’s face, soft and careful like if he’s any rougher he’ll shatter it—whatever this is, he’ll shatter it—and then he tilts Eddie’s face just so and the kiss _changes_ , Richie’s lips start to open against Eddie’s and he _hums_ like he’s _melting_ , like he’s unraveling, like he wants Eddie to unravel too, and Eddie—

_Loosen up, you know I just like to fuck with you._

—panics.

“ _God_ , Richie—!”

Very suddenly he can feel his body again, shoves Richie back, stumbles back a bit himself. His heart feels like it’s fighting its way up out of Eddie’s chest just to get _back_ to him. He sighs something more of a growl through numb, buzzing lips that can still feel Richie’s, _goddammit_.

“What the hell?!”

“ _I’m sorry!_ ” Richie rushes out, hands raised up in surrender, eyes wide like saucers. He looks terrified, watching Eddie like he might bite a hole into his neck. “Shit, I shouldn’t have done that, I’m sorry!”

“ _Asshole!_ ” Eddie manages, breathing hard. “Is this the part where you say I kiss just like my fucking _mom?!_ ”

“Uhm.” The lights twinkle mockingly in his eyes as he looks down at Eddie. He shakes his head, like he’s trying to shake all the fog away. “Do you want me to?” He looks so clueless, Eddie almost believes him, but he knows better.

Eddie’s seen that look a thousand times right before a “ _gotcha_ ” and that’s worse. He’s so, so scared that he was _right_. That this is part of the joke, and Richie’s just toying with him; that it’s all been in his head. That Richie’s eyes would never really be on him the way he stupidly thought they were all night long, and it _hurts_. “Richie if you’re fucking with me, if all this has been some long drawn out joke on me, I swear to god you need to tell me now or I’ll fucking—”

“Wait, wait, what are you talking about?”

“Why’d you do that?! Why’d you fucking _kiss_ me?!”

Richie’s looking at him like he grew a second _head_. “Isn’t it obvious?” he asks slowly, like one would ask a child, and that’s _not_ helping.

“ _No!_ It’s not obvious!” Eddie stresses. “Was it—were you just fucking around again? Was it just a ‘heat of the moment’ kind of thing? Do you… do you _like_ me? What is it? Can you _please_ just,” he huffs, and it comes out more petulant than he would have liked. He glares down at his shoes. “Why’d you kiss me, Richie?”

Richie’s jaw drops. “Because I wanted to?” he rolls his eyes. “Because I _like_ you, maybe?”

Eddie scoffs. “Be goddamn serious for two seconds, Richie, what’s in this for you?”

“Dude, I fucking _am_ being serious!”

“How do you expect me to just _believe_ you about this kind of thing?! You’ve been fucking with me for years!”

“You mean _flirting_ with you?!” Richie exclaims, indignant.

It makes Eddie pause, heat flooding his face at the intensity in Richie’s angry eyes. The cogs in his brain screech to a halt for a humiliating moment as he tries to _process_ that, but he just _can’t_. _You mean flirting with you?_ It bounces around in Eddie’s brain, back and forth off the walls. _Flirting with you, flirting with you, flirting w_ —

“S-sure,” Eddie manages somehow, brain lagging about fifty paces behind, “if that’s what you call it when you get my hopes up and then make sure I know you could never be serious about _anything_ with me! Then yeah! Flirting with me!”

“Oh, it’s not like that, Eddie!”

“It fucking _isn’t?_ ” Eddie argues, and his hands start to shake at his sides in all his anger. He balls them into fists before Richie can see. “It isn’t you fucking around with me when you make fun of me all day about my goddamn shorts—”

Richie scoffs. “Because I think they’re cute!”

“—or my fanny pack?” Eddie continues, forces himself to focus on what he was saying, not what Richie’s trying to distract him with. “When you dump all my shit out of it and then _laugh_ at me when I yell at you—”

“ _Classic_ flirting!”

“—or when you spend all day pissing me off and embarrassing me in front of the asshole theatre kids and yelling about fucking my _mom—_ ”

“ _You_ , Eddie!” Richie screams, lanky arms flinging out and around in utter exasperation. “Obviously it’s _you_ I wanna get my dick in!”

“Well you should have just—!” Eddie rears back and nearly bites his tongue in the process of shutting his mouth so quickly. He knows he’s fully red in the face, knows it’s spreading down to his neck and out to his ears. _You should have said that_ — “How in the fuck was I supposed to know that, Richie?! Any of that?!”

“Everyone else seems to get it but you!”

Eddie rears back, _mortified_ as he lets that sink in, tries to decide if it’s true, if he’s really been so preoccupied trying not to be the butt of Richie’s jokes in one way that he’s just doomed himself to the same fate in another. He shakes his head. “What the _fuck’s_ that supposed to mean?”

“It means I make a complete jackass out of myself just to get your attention!” he yells, glaring when Eddie scoffs and rolls his eyes. Richie glares back, steps closer. “I do! I fucking sneak into your room in the middle of the night just to lay in your bed with you! I fucking made us a prom!”

“You’re only like that when we’re alone!” Eddie snaps, feeling horrifically like he might _cry_ , he’s so frustrated. “When there’s no one there but me hanging on your every _bullshit_ word! What the fuck am I supposed to think?!”

“Well what would _you_ have had me do?” Richie snaps, smiles bitter and sardonic as he stares down at him. “Yell it from the fucking rooftops how I feel so someone could come push me off? Hold your hand around school for ten minutes before someone breaks all my goddamn fingers? Or maybe I could gift you my fucking _teeth_ in a heart-shaped box after the jock assholes get done kicking them out of my gay-ass skull—”

“ _No_ , asshole, god, _stop it_ , Richie!” Eddie shouts, mortified. “That’s _not_ what I’m—that’s not what I’m saying, and you fucking know it! Jesus, just because we can’t be gross and excessive like Bill and Bev doesn’t mean I should have to be your secret dirty little punching bag plaything, Richie!”

“ _Eddie!_ ” Richie stresses, hands coming up to fist in his own hair like he just can’t take it, like he has the _right_. “Why are you so fucking hellbent on thinking the _worst_ of me?” he snaps, and Eddie sees red.

“I _don’t_ ,” he seethes vehemently, “think the worst of you!”

“You’re standing here asking me if I kissed you as a _joke_ , Eddie!” Richie argues. “You thought I was fucking with you this whole time—is _that_ why you weren’t ready when I got to your house? Because you thought I wasn’t coming?”

“ _Richie_ — _!_ ”

“Like I’d go through the trouble of finally asking you out just to stand you up?! You act like I spend all my time _lying_ to you or something!”

Eddie’s jaw _drops_. “No, don’t fucking _do_ that, I didn’t _say_ that, I don’t think you’re a _liar!_ ”

“Just that I’m impossible to believe _ever!_ ”

“Hey, this isn’t my fault!” Eddie snaps, confused and angry, and almost wishing Richie _hadn’t_ shown up. Eddie could be getting ready for bed right now instead of down here in the clubhouse with Richie picking long overdue _fights_. “It’s not my fault you’re always fucking around so much it’s hard to believe you!”

“Not with _you!_ ” Richie insists, yells it down into Eddie’s face like that’ll help him grasp it. “Maybe I mess with the others, and piss Stan and Bev off, but it’s different with you, you have to _know_ that! I don’t… I don’t talk to them like I talk to you! I don’t talk to _anyone_ like I talk to you!”

“Well this is what _happens_ when you fuck around all the time!” Eddie explodes. It comes up and out of him from deep in his gut, a pit full of rage Eddie can’t keep a tamper on any longer. He unleashes it and shouts down _god_. “You can’t just flirt with me— _badly_ —and then say it’s a joke over and over, for years and years, and expect me not to get _used_ to that in some way! Because now, in case you hadn’t caught on, I always expect it to be a joke no matter what, and that really fucking _sucks_ because I care about you, and that’s not a joke to me! The way I feel about you has _never_ been a joke to me so when you pretend to feel it back and play all your stupid games about it, I just think you’re being an _asshole_ _—_ ”

“I’m _in love_ with you, Eddie, I’m not fucking pretending _anything!_ ”

He yells it so loudly, it echoes around the clubhouse, and what follows next is a silence so dead, Eddie’s ears start to ring a little with it—with the silence, with Richie’s words. They ring back again and again in his head as he _stares_ at Richie, who doesn't look quite angry anymore, isn’t laughing or smirking or looking away. For the first time since Eddie can remember, Richie isn’t hiding from him. Richie just said he _loves_ him, and he looks resigned to it.

“And I never wanted to fucking hurt you,” Richie manages with hard-set eyes, chest rising and falling still from all the yelling. “So, I’m sorry for making you think I did, and I’m sorry for making you feel like a punchline, but you wanna know a worse punchline?” He huffs a cruel, sardonic laugh, and Eddie almost hates it, it’s so unlike him. “I _would_ have yelled it from the goddamn rooftops, Eddie. I would have let them break my fingers, and I would have let them punch all my fucking teeth out if I even thought I had half a fucking chance with you.”

“Richie,” Eddie murmurs helplessly, breathlessly. Richie’s words punch the air right out of him. He steps closer, but Richie won’t meet his eyes.

“And you know what else? When Bev asked us that about prom, all I could think about was dancing with you the way Bill gets to do whatever he wants with Bev,” Richie says like he can’t stop himself. He crosses his arms and it feels like a wall between them, and he still won’t meet Eddie’s eyes. “And then you asked me again that night in your room and it just came out of me, but you didn’t believe me. Because why would you when I’m always like this with you?” he lets out a bitter laugh, a forced shrug. He’s hurt, and he’ll never just say that.

Because it’s _Richie_. It’s all so very Richie to do this—to bury the important things beneath too-hard shoves and too-loud jokes that hit too close to home. To come to the conclusion, all on his own, that it’s better to be laughed at for being laughable than to be laughed at for being genuine; to laugh at himself for loving Eddie rather than have Eddie laugh at him for showing it.

“Richie, look at me.”

He does, with hard eyes and a set jaw like he’s mad at the whole world. “I’m sorry I’m a dick, okay, but I was trying to keep all this from you,” Richie tells him, drops his eyes down. Eddie doesn’t think he means to look ashamed, but he does, and Eddie is _so tired_ of him being ashamed. He brings both his hands to Richie’s shoulders and only then can he tell how stiffly he’s holding himself in, like if he moves, he’ll ruin it. Like he could possibly make it worse. “I tried not to get it all over you because I thought you’d _want_ that, but the way you looked at me in your room when I said I’d take you to fucking prom, I couldn’t hide it anymore. I’ll leave you alone after this if you want, but I don’t think I can keep _hiding_ —”

There’s no thought process in Eddie’s head other than _need_ and _want_ and _please understand_ when he does it, when he reaches up with shaky fingers to grab Richie’s jaw and tug him desperately down. When he stretches up onto his toes to kiss Richie silent, when he throws himself freely at Richie and finally trusts Richie to catch him.

And he does. _Of course_ , Eddie thinks in the thick of it all, _of course_ he does. He grabs Eddie around the middle, kisses him back so quickly and hectically it feels uncontrollable. He kisses Eddie like he may never get another chance, and that _guts_ him, makes him hold Richie’s face a little lighter, makes him mold himself against him a little softer, makes him try to convey that he’s not going anywhere, that this is real, that they have _time_.

Richie’s hands slowly stop shaking at Eddie’s sides as he unwinds in slow increments, kisses him so earnestly and openly, Eddie starts to gets lost in it, arms coming up to circle Richie’s neck to keep him close, to keep himself grounded. Richie holds him back just as close, just as frantically, kisses him just as deeply, just as softly, more and more until Eddie can’t breathe. He pulls away and looks up at a red-faced, lip-bitten Richie, staring back down at him with wide blown eyes. He thinks stupidly of the inhaler he doesn’t need somewhere on his desk back home and feels feral.

“Eds—”

“I don’t fucking want you to hide how you feel from me anymore, you hear me?” Eddie blurts out, flushed, breathing hard, and crazy. “You can—you can get it all over me—I _want_ you to, because I love you back, okay? I love you, too.”

Richie makes a sound deep in his throat like want and desperation and Eddie—god, he feels like that too. “Fuck, Eds, you don’t even _know_. Been just about fucking obsessed with you since we were kids—it’s not exactly pretty, and last I checked,” he laughs darkly, deprecatingly, “you don’t like being covered in gross messes. Not sure you really get what you’re asking for—”

“ _Richie_.” With an angry huff, Eddie reaches up for Richie’s jaw, molds his fingers around the bone to drag him lower and push their foreheads together. He glares fiercely into Richie’s wide eyes. “Do your fucking _worst_.”

Richie huffs in disbelief, a low short stop of a thing against Eddie’s lips and proceeds to kiss him completely senseless. He takes Eddie’s hips and backs him up against the dirt wall and kisses him so deeply, Eddie’s knees go weak and wobbly. He wraps his arms tight around Richie’s shoulders just to hold himself up and kind of goes limp and mindless otherwise, losing himself in Richie, Richie, _Richie_ —

“Eds.”

“Huh?” He hears himself and wants to be mortified at how wrecked he sounds. He opens his eyes, not knowing when he’d shut them. He blinks blearily up at a smug, smirking Richie and wishes he could look half as put-together about this as Richie does.

His nose bumps Eddie’s as he speaks in a low, hushed tone Eddie’s already latching onto. “Jeez, glad that’s all cleared up now, huh?” he laughs lowly, clearly enjoying himself as he pulls at Eddie’s bottom lip with his thumb.

It starts to catch up to him then, everything that just happened, and he wants to be mortified at whatever the fuck had come over him, but he just can’t. How can he be when Richie is looking at him like that? Like he’s something reverent, something both beautiful and horrifying? It makes him want to kiss Richie stupid all over again just as much as it makes him want to scream. “I’ll… clear it up for you as many times as you want,” he promises, and Richie looks at him like he’s kind of winded.

“Okay,” he says back. He’s watching Eddie like he’s never seen him before, eyes mapping around Eddie’s face as his lips curl up into that smile. Eddie can only imagine how open and unguarded he must look for Richie to stare at him that way. He’s still breathless and gooey and wrapped around Richie’s stupid long fingers. Like this, he wants to make Richie a thousand promises, but he keeps it simple.

“Okay, Eddie echoes, because he thinks it finally is.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!! Please come scream at me on ~~[Tumblr](https://ambitiousskychild.tumblr.com/)~~ if you fancy, i could scream about reddie all day  
> Please let me know what you thought :)


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